Unpopular opinion... I don't think Eric Clapton is very great.

[Priaptor]

Quoting Snopes as a fact checker has become a new low among those on the left. Snopes claims its true and therefore it is. Of course context never has anything to do with it. 

 

Yeah, so Clapton makes an overtly racist statement during his drug, alcohol, etc. addicted days.  His best buddies were worried he was going to die. 

 

Anyone who has ever remotely had anything to do with or followed Clapton will know that there are few musicians who have credited their careers to or been bigger fans of those black musicians who enabled their styles more than Clapton. No one person was a bigger fan of Hendrix than Clapton. No single person has been a bigger cheerleader for previous unknown US black blues and jazz artists than Clapton.  

 

So lets just rewrite history in the typical revisionist woke method of today and destroy one of the greatest guitarists and musicians of our time with one single "snopes verified" commentary about a man many here so willingly want to denigrate. 

 

By the way if we were to use the Snopes version of racism, 2/3 of MSNBC, CNN and major networks should be titled as racists; can we quote some of Don Lemons, Joy Reid, etc. comments to. Those racists and anti-Semites, however, spew their hatred for Jews and white people under the cover of the oppressed and are protected from any criticism or banishment. A joke. 

 

Eric Clapton, RIP, just another BAD old white guy. LMAO.  

[Priaptor]

1 minute ago, The Computer Audiophile said:

 

I don't think anyone here said that. However, Clapton admitting this, kind of means it's true, unless you're waiting for Q to approve of it.

 

:~)

Yeah so he said it and people want to paint him "racist" for his comments during a horrible period of his life because snopes verified it and throw away all that preceded and followed it. 

 

Oh start with the Q bullshit. Great comeback Chris. LMAO. 

 

If we want to start with anti-Semitic and racist entertainers, reporters, musicians, etc. many many worse than Clapton if the woke care to admit it. 

[Priaptor]

4 minutes ago, The Computer Audiophile said:

 

I know many people who've gone through equally horrible periods in their lives. They never once got on the racist bandwagon. I know it's different for everyone though. 

 

The cool thing is we all get to decide. 

OH now there lies a metric that we can take solace in, people YOU know that had equally horrible periods in their lives. You have no idea just like I have no idea just how horrible places people find themselves in. 

 

No excuse for his comments BUT I will look at the man in totality rather than judge him superficially like you are for a single comment he made during a horrible period in his life. 

 

I can quote many more racist, anti-Semitic, misogynist and overall hateful speech from entertainers, newscasters, writers, Hollywooders, etc. who made such comments while straight than you can ever quote Clapton OR for that matter who has been a bigger proponent for the Black entertainer than Clapton. 

[Priaptor]

5 minutes ago, The Computer Audiophile said:

 

Count this as another thing I'll never understand. 

 

Speaking out is encouraged, unless you have a platform, such as a musician or entertainer. Makes no sense to me. I like to hear what everyone has to say. This makes it easy to either support them, ignore them, or remove them from my library. 

 

I also like music that sticks it to the man, no matter who the man is. I just like it. I like people freely speaking their minds.

 

I'm also not a fan of canceling anyone or thing. I like when idiots such as mahmoud ahmadinejad speak at the UN and deny the holocaust. Show how stupid you are on the world stage. Fine with me. 

Yeah but the cancel culture is selective. In this day and age of huge anti-Semitism, those you quote making their anti-Semitic comments are buttressed and condoned by the ever increasing anti-Semites around the world and soon guess what, their version of Snopes will quote one of these lunatics as verified fact checked truism and the anti-Semitism will grow helped along by those useful idiots who listen to such as Roger Waters, Desean Jackson, Sharpton, etc. as verification of their generalizations. 

[Priaptor]

Just now, AudioDoctor said:

Like alcohol, drugs can be a truth serum of sorts when the person loses the filter they normally have in place, you get to see the truth.

I couldn't agree more. 

 

The point being is context and a mans life needs to be evaluated in total and not just by some dumb comments made during a heated or drugged out moment. Bias and hatred will, unfortunately, always find a way to during stress and intoxication. 

 

As a former very competitive BBall player in the late 60s and 70s in NYC, who has come in contact with many black, Italian, Irish as well as Jewish competitors, 13 whose names I will leave to obscurity, I can tell you hate has no boundary when it comes to religion, skin color, etc. in the heat of the moment. The first time I was called a "kike and Jew Bastard" was by a guy I later became good friends with that went on to become a famous person. Do I judge these guys based on some of the things they said to me and ignore their whole life? Of course not. We became good friends and understood the human element of such comments and inherent bias bubbling to the top during these testosterone laden times. 

 

NOW on the other hand when people like Waters, Dwayne Wade, Lebron, Desean Jackson, Don Lemon, etc. make their overtly anti-Semitic comments on social media and TV with nothing spurring their comments like intoxication or any other inciting factor it is telling. 

[Priaptor]

2 minutes ago, firedog said:

Of course none of that means he isn't a racist.

I'm not saying he is, just saying being a fan/admirer/helper of individual Black persons doesn't contradict one being a racist in general against "other" Black people and thinking/behaving as a racist towards all of those who aren't on a small "special list" of exemptions.

Lots of serious racists have individuals from the hated group that they make exceptions for.

 

 

Yup the old trick, "prove he isn't a racist". Prove you aren't one. 

 

You do realize that Clapton has worked with and help expand the careers of more Black underpaid and poorly received artists than just about any performer, pretty much unheard of during a time when few black performers could break through the ranks. Some of the greatest and ingenious black performers during the 60s and 70s were helped by Clapton. 

[Priaptor]

2 minutes ago, charlesphoto said:

Spot on. It always bothers me the disconnect one sees at large sporting events, esp in basketball and football, of mostly black players on the field and white fans in the audience. If those white fans truly supported the black athletes, and not just as tools to garner a fe rushes of adrenaline, they wouldn't have had any issue with them taking a knee in support of BLM. 

WOW where to begin with this woke garbage. BLM "the movement" is as big a hypocrisy as there is. Funny the example you use. Well if those blacks on the court, that you are choosing to segregate from the "white fans" in the stands, really wanted to make a statement, let them donate 3/4 of their salaries to the black community to buy tickets to watch them play and support the propaganda BLM and their enforcers want to spew. 

 

To some who want to drink the Kool Aide BLM is all things to others they recognize the BS entailed. 

[Priaptor]

Just now, The Computer Audiophile said:

 

We aren't talking about BLM. We are talking about people being free to support whatever they want without being canceled. 

 

That is NOT what the poster was referring to. By the way, in terms of cancel culture, you just admitted to cancelling those parts of the reading of Little House on the Prairie to your daughter. Do what you like, but its your own personal way of cancelling.

 

From my POV, especially being a Jew, I never want my history cancelled. Whether it be the many diasporas, the enslavement, pogroms, holocausts, blatant anti-Semitism past or present or any other part of it, no matter how heinous, I want it preserved not eliminated or whitewashed as we are witnessing both here and abroad. But that is me and my desires; however many others, including many of my own religion, are choosing a different path. 

[Priaptor]

13 minutes ago, charlesphoto said:

All I need to know, right there. Probably best to go back to discussing whether USB cables have a sound or not. Welcome to my ignore list. 

Yup how does it feel to be a useful idiot. What is your claim to being woke? Watching a Spike Lee movie. LMAO. Stick to judging music as you suck in judging me. 

[Priaptor]

10 minutes ago, firedog said:

Wow. That's your reaction?

No tricks involved. I specifically said I don't know if he is one. Didn't say that quote from 1976 proves anything.

 

Your two posts prove nothing about Clapton or about racism.

 

Again, a person can be a racist yet still have positive feelings towards exceptional individuals from the hated group.

 

There were Nazis who had favored Jewish individuals.

 

When I grew up in the Southern US, there were families who treated a Black domestic servant like one of the family and loved her, but were horrible racists and segregationists. They would even say racist things in front of the person and then say, "but not you".

 

The same kind of thing could possibly be true of Clapton. Not really sure what is so hard for you to understand here.

Or is it just that you can't help but turn any discussion of anything into a political argument?

Once again you cast aspersions with insidious comments with obvious implications so you can plausibly deny what you "meant". I get it as that is your style, but here in America unlike elsewhere, you are supposed to prove someone of what you claim rather than the individual prove he is innocent of what you accuse him of being. Doesn't always work that way BUT that is how it was framed by those now denigrated and dead old white males. 

[Priaptor]

1 minute ago, The Computer Audiophile said:

Wait, you just judged him then told him to not judge you? Did I see that right?

 

Anyway, I'm listening to some great music right now. 

Chris the nice thing about digital is like Little House on the Prairie, when listening, you can personally cancel by fast forwarding, those parts you consider racist.

[Priaptor]

1 minute ago, ssh said:

A "bigger proponent for the Black entertainer"? How about Bing Crosby?

Yes I clarified my comments by saying in "modern times" or in the 60s and 70s. It was rhetorical. There have been many proponents and very happily the black entertainer rarely requires the help of these people anymore. 

 

My mother knew Louis Armstrong. I only found out about this after she died. My mother worked as a bookkeeper at some of NYs Jazz spots and ultimately the Copa. Unbeknownst to me, he was partially raised by a Jewish guy in NO who spoke Yiddish and became fluent in Yiddish and would speak to my mother in Yiddish. Unfortunately my mother has passed and there is only one cousin I have that has an information on my mom's crazy past and her Jazz love which I never knew. 

[Priaptor]

4 minutes ago, The Computer Audiophile said:

 

Yeah, but then I get the racist taste in my mouth and I want to puke. I just delete from my library. 

That I get and why I have chosen to CANCEL all things Roger Waters from my library. Same for Wagner

[Priaptor]

5 minutes ago, The Computer Audiophile said:

 

This is a story I can get behind. Much more interesting than the headache causing stuff we've been discussing. 

Yeah, I agree. I am trying to get as much information from my cousin as she ages. Apparently my mother wasn't as innocent as I thought. Unfortunately she had a severe stroke at the age of 46 but lived until 79 and my father who has also passed took great care of her till the end.

 

ONLY after they both passed did I find out that my mom, from an early age of 16+, would travel in some dubious circles of Jewish Mafia types that had their tentacles in the NY entertainment industry and one of them she actually married and divorced a year later for cheating, which I only found out about years after her passing. Pretty shocking and verified with pictures from my cousin who has since shared them with me. Not sure if my dad ever knew or not as they only met after he returned from WWII and was working for Western Electric where my aunt introduced him to my mother. 

 

Divorce back in the late 30s was a Scarlett letter. 

 

My cousin is also interesting growing up in the Sheepshead Bay area in Brooklyn and dated Neil Sedaka and was introduced to the then in music group of the many great entertainers being spawned during those years. She actually introduced me to some great entertainment from the Village in those days for which I am eternally grateful. Her father also was the ONLY one who had a real stereo an old Fisher that got me into listening at a very young age. 

[Priaptor]

2 minutes ago, sphinxsix said:

 

 

I'm addicted to tobacco and tea and I'm sometimes worried I might die one day and still I'm not racist.

 

As Firefox stated, prove it. Am I to believe you aren't a racist because you say so. I am sure you have made some comments that were offensive to some, maybe even racist or xenophobic to some, the difference is there was no recording of it. 

[Priaptor]

56 minutes ago, The Computer Audiophile said:

Fascinating stuff. 

Yes, my best friend growing up, we have been close friends since we are 5 having met in our Apartment building, his mother (also a Jewish divorcee) was a secretary in the Empire state building for NOW. She was incredibly progressive for her time and as she has now passed her 90th birthday is even more so.  My best buddy and I are literally on opposite ends of the political spectrum BUT our bonds are deeper than that.

 

The reason I bring her into the discussion is because as a kid, what did I know from this stuff. She knew Phil Ochs, which ONLY later in life did I come to understand the AMAZING significance of as I LOVE his stuff. She dragged my buddy and I to this tiny coffee shop in Kew Gardens, Queens in NY from Brooklyn, which took hours to get to by train and foot to see him perform in this tiny venue. I barely remember it but remember being pissed off. I wish there was a time machine. 

[Priaptor]

1 minute ago, charlesphoto said:

I don't know, you tell me.

Well I don't know if it is just the "old Conservative white males" BUT someone much smarter than me, a great historian is on record stating the only thing more dead than the American White Male is the American White Male on Horseback. 

 

I don't know but from my perch, the "old white males", Conservative and Liberal alike, making up the overwhelming majority of those lying in military graveyards may just deserve a little more praise than the utter disgust and scorn being given them.

[Priaptor]

3 minutes ago, AudioDoctor said:

 

After my Grandpa passed my Grandma began telling stories about Grandpa running moonshine for Al Capone, about all his shenanigans and exploits... We all thought she was going senile until she insisted we go visit the (now gone) Al Capone "museum" which was on an Indian Reservation in Wisconsin and saw his picture on the walls...

Very cool. Yeah Chicago and NY back then have tons of stories written everywhere. The reason my mom was "connected" I found out was because my grandfather had this little luncheonette in downtown Brooklyn, which had pinball machines. Now you turned OVER the take from those things or you went out of business. My mother with her sisters and parents lived over the luncheonette and apparently that is how sordid past began. 

[Priaptor]

6 minutes ago, Jud said:

I've seen Clapton live and think he's a helluva guitarist. Absolutely love Van Morrison's music, too. But since the idiocy of the anti-lockdown song, combined with Clapton's drunken racist ravings in public before he kicked alcohol, I don't feel like giving either of them my money from streaming or downloads. I'll be content with the extensive collections of their music I already own if I want to hear something of theirs.

 

Now as an antidote to such thoughts, here:

 

 

Everyone is entitled to their opinion but not necessarily the dogma of "facts" when the "facts" are often being determined more by propaganda and absolutes as compared to changing paradigms to either support or refute the "facts". Unfortunately, the airtime given to certain "experts"  has usurped those of many other experts, including some of the most brilliant epidemiologists and immunologists in the world. Your comment  "idiocy of the anti-lockdown song". My perspective is that it is idiocy for any lay person, using their unknowing standing to push one way or another.

 

However, as to the veracity of the appropriateness and effectiveness of lockdowns, there are huge disparate opinions and facts to support or refute each other and the dogma of calling it idiocy to be against lockdowns may be pushing the envelop. Lockdowns have in fact proven to be disastrous on multiple fronts while doing little to stem the spread of COVID; enough examples here, in Europe and Israel  and many other countries to prove the point. On the other hand, we are seeing untoward numbers of violent crimes, domestic (including child abuse), drug overdoses, morbidity and mortality relating to lockdowns and failure to get treatment timely and the list goes on.

 

In fact, the propagandists who want us to BELIEVE one way of thinking have NOW had to admit this secondary effect to the point where they are now including these stats as "COVID related morbidity and mortality" INSTEAD of morbidity and mortality related to a particularly way of dealing with COVID, namely lockdowns. The concept of "herd immunity" another manipulated term by some has been used to denigrate, while, it is a very simple concept to understand without the need to invoke infecting the whole population with millions of deaths as some are claiming Atlas and others have been pushing for. It is strictly objective, mathematical and the formula is simple:

 

Rt= R0x (1-i) x (1-p), where Rt is infectivity after factors on the right taken into account and i is infectivity or immunized and p is mitigation such as masks, etc. The problem lies that when this became propagandized and political facts took a backseat to bullshit so you had deniers who refused the science of vaccines and masks and on the other side you had the deniers who believed that the concept of "herd immunity" could only be met with strict lockdowns and that anything else was a disaster. So the idiocy lies not with one POV but the bullshit and propaganda and the useful idiots who believe propaganda instead of science and those in the field who believe in dogma instead of the all facts, whether they fit their narrative or not. 

 

As to their song, like I said, entertainers would be better sticking to entertaining. 

[Priaptor]

19 minutes ago, AudioDoctor said:

 

My Grandpa apparently just liked excitement. WW2 cured him of that I think, after that he became a normal hard working farmer for the rest of his very long life.

You bring up a very pertinent point. I am not sure how old you are. Growing up in a Brooklyn apt. you would always hear screaming couples in the hallway, see fights all the time, here from friends how the parents went crazy on them, etc. The WWII cure also had tons of untreated PTSD accounting for most of it I am sure. Coming back from these heinous experiences. Leaving from Biloxi all gung ho for the unknown finding yourself in the pacific or battlefields of Europe must have been an absurd shock to one's reality testing that few can imagine. 

[Priaptor]

3 minutes ago, The Computer Audiophile said:

I was thinking about this logic. Should the same be said for welders, accountants, engineers, etc..?

 

The silence may be golden, but the lack of opinions would be boring. 

There is a difference. Most of today's opinions are coming from people who have no to little knowledge of the topic they opine about that I call the "copy and paste" mentality where someone claims a fact no matter how absurd, another (snopes for example) validates it and now it is accepted truth. Hey even the experts today often are influenced by the same propagandist garbage. Some of the medical journals and science journals are filled with this crap.

 

I have no issue with "opinion" just those who are make baseless dogmatic opinion based loosely or without factual backups. Like I said, the NET has made everyone an armchair expert about everything with dumb conspiracy theory flying everywhere from both sides of the isle. "The idiocy of anti-lockdowns" just one but by no means the only. AND I don't mean to go after Jud as he is one of the most informed out there but unfortunately he made the statement and I use it to make a point. 

[Priaptor]

8 minutes ago, charlesphoto said:

I've photographed plenty of black musician's and celebrities, including Mr Lee.. Doesn't in the least bit make me more 'woke.' But I'd rather be awake to the present than sleeping in the past.

 

Last year I was verbally harassed in the rural suburbs because I was wearing a BLM shirt from my kid's elementary school (which is majority African-American). I was waiting outside a small coffee shop because some maskless contractor dude was inside (how do I know he was a contractor? The Carhartt overalls and giant pickup truck parked diagonally across two spaces was the dead giveaway). When he came out he spotted my shirt and started frothing about how it was a terrorist organization etc. I finally lost it and told him to 'f*ck off. Of course he acted all hurt and said it proved his point. Dude, I told him, I was just wanting to get a coffee and YOU are the one that started going off on ME - not to mention  exposing the young women working the coffee shop because you are not abiding by the mask mandate (it pissed me off when I spotted him inside but I wasn't going to say anything until he started in on me). I have every right to tell you to go f*ck yourself, I told him. He kept sputtering nonsense as he got into his giant pickup. Talk about a one way street. 

So there you go you proved the point of anecdote justifying and proving your biased angst for some. You are now a proven woke person by anecdote. Incredible how you fell the legitimacy by your views to legitimize the warped and inane view of the right wing contract worker, etc. LMAO. 

 

Yeah, well I know of many religious Jews in Crown Heights back in the Sharpton lets get the Jew days false narrative who were abused and attacked by blacks in their own communities. In fact, to this day in Williamsburg and Crown Heights there are still Jews being attacked by blacks with those attacks being posted on Twitter and elsewhere. 

 

Claiming anything from anecdote sucks and why my tongue in cheep example above has as much usefulness as tits on a bull as your politically biased anecdote. 

[Priaptor]

50 minutes ago, sphinxsix said:

Once I was punched in the face without any reason or warning, while walking down the 5th or 6th Av in Manhattan after midnight. The guy was a well, better than me, built black man about 30. Probably on crack - he was talking to himself, moving forth and back - a normal thing in NY back then, I didn't pay much attention while passing him.. till I felt the punch on my jaw that is. As it happened - this was the second time in my life I got punched in the face without any reason or warning - the first time took place in Paris a couple years earlier, that guy was also black - he was exiting a subway train while I was waiting to enter it, simply punched me in the face while leaving it. My friends stopped me from moving quite aggressively towards him to explain what was going on and just dragged me into the train.

After the Manhattan event however, I came to the conclusion that if I don't react this time I may have some racist problem deep inside, so I decided to act. I turned around after a minute or two and followed the guy who soon noticed that I was following him and managed to lose his 'tail' that is me after a couple of minutes. I didn't give up though and I was walking around the area till I found him . He was standing on the corner of an avenue in a relatively bright light and I was approaching him walking down quite dark street. I was walking towards him like an angry, self-assured bull with my eyes pointed at his, waiting for the moment when he spots me. He did - when I was 15-20 meters away, and he recognized me of course, I saw fear and hesitation in his eyes. 'What's up, man?' he shouted. I thought 'In a moment you will see what's up moth.....r..'. I quickly stopped, spread my feet quite wide and reached for a gun that I had under my under jacket, which I quickly pointed at him. At this point - I should add a non-existing gun which unfortunately he had no chance to see as such, cause the place where I stood was much darker than where he was. What happened next.? You've guessed it right - I didn't shoot him, what happened next was actually my witnessing to what I bet was a beating of the 400m world record. In addition zigzagging. I can't prove this was a 400m zigzagging world record though.

 

This is how I've managed to avoid becoming a racist (at least a small one in some well hidden corner of myself).

 

I can't prove it though @Priaptor..

 

 

Nice story BUT two points and I digress with those two points:
1. "The guy was a well, better than me, built black man about 30. Probably on crack". Some here consider that racist on it's face for such a generalization, no?

2. Are we going this person a pass for his criminal act because he was "probably on crack" as an explanation yet Clapton, on drugs and alcohol deserves no such leeway? A double standard?

 

In any case, it is a dangerous world and as the expression goes I rather have my CCW and not need it than need it and not have it. 

[Priaptor]

22 minutes ago, The Computer Audiophile said:

I'm much more a fan of Hendrix work than Clapton.

Not sure why you can't enjoy both. I do. 

 

While an amazing and probably the greatest guitarist of my lifetime, much of the Hendrix stems from his untimely death. If he had lived I wonder what path he would have taken and if, like Clapton, would take some paths to pretty vanilla rock or would've continued on his innovative paths.

 

Personally as a fan, I enjoy Knopfler more than any, even if his skillset as a guitarist doesn't rank with Hendrix

 

[Priaptor]

1 minute ago, sphinxsix said:

 

I don't see any generalization here. I lived in NY in the 90s, I know more or less what people on crack look like, regardless of the color of their skin.

 

 

No-one is giving him a 'pass' here, at least I didn't notice. I'm quite sporty man but frankly I wouldn't like to have to do with a guy taller and better built than me in the middle of the night, especially with a guy on crack. Regardless of the color of his skin. Or shoes for that matter 

 

 

This attitude is one of the reasons why the number of Americans could be higher than it is and I can assure you not everyone who 'isn't' anymore due to this deserved it.

 

Well I am just playing into the one way generalizations being made on this thread.

 

As to your last line of reasoning, the stats don't support your claim is it pertains to being trained and meeting the requirements for a CCW; in fact quite he opposite.